NanoComputer

The claim that nanopore technology is on the verge of making DNA analysis so fast and cheap that a person’s entire genome could be sequenced in just minutes and at a fraction of the cost of available commercial methods, has resulted in overwhelming academic, industrial, and global interest. But a review by Northeastern University – Boston – physicist Meni Wanunu, published in a special issue on nanopore sequencing in Physics of Life Reviews, questions whether the remaining technical hurdles can be overcome to create a workable, easily produced commercial device.

Earlier this year Oxford Nanopore Technologies, one of the pioneering companies of sequencing discoveries, announced that they expect nanopore strand sequencing to achieve a 15-minute genome by 2014 at a cost of $1,500. This is a far cry from the $10 million it cost to sequence an entire genome just 5 years ago. Since the idea of nanopore sequencing was first proposed in the mid 1990s, huge advances have been made. The basic idea is exceedingly simple: a single thread of DNA is passed through a tiny molecule-sized hole—or nanopore—and the various DNA bases are identified in sequence as they move through the pore.

But according to Wanunu, the reality of manipulating technology based on pores so tiny that 25,000 of them can fit side by side on a human hair has proved a daunting task. The main challenge has been to slow the process down and control the movement of the DNA strand through the pore at a rate slow enough to make individual DNA bases readable and usable. A new approach using enzyme-controlled movement, developed to overcome this problem, has its own drawbacks including poor enzyme activity resulting in limited processivity and uncontrolled forward-reverse motion.
Source:
- http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/authored_newsitem.cws_home
/companynews05_02508?navopenmenu=3
- http://www.northeastern.edu/news/2012/09/nanopores-promise-cost-savings-in-gene-sequencing/

Currently, large doses of chemotherapy are required when treating certain forms of cancer, resulting in toxic side effects. The chemicals enter the body and work to destroy or shrink the tumor, but also harm vital organs and drastically affect bodily functions. Now, scientists at the University of Missouri have proven that a new form of prostate cancer treatment that uses radioactive gold nanoparticles, and was developed at MU, is safe to use in dogs. Sandra Axiak-Bechtel , an assistant professor in oncology at the MU College of Veterinary Medicine , says that this is a big step for gold nanoparticle research.

“Proving that gold nanoparticles are safe to use in the treatment of prostate cancer in dogs is a big step toward gaining approval for clinical trials in men,” Axiak-Bechtel said. “Dogs develop prostate cancer naturally in a very similar way as humans, so the gold nanoparticle treatment has a great chance to translate well to human patients.”

Source:

http://munews.missouri.edu/news-releases/2012/1015-gold-nanoparticle-prostate-cancer-treatment-found-safe-in-dogs-mu-study-shows/

Imagine that in the future people will never get older. Scientists from Valencia -Spain- have developed an intelligent nanodevice that lays the foundations for the future development of new therapies against aging. The device consists of nanoparticles that can selectively release drugs in aged human cells. Its potential future use ranges from the treatment of diseases involving tissue or cellular degeneration such as cancer, Alzheimer‘s or Parkinson‘s, among others, to accelerated aging disorders (progeria).

“The nanodevice that we have developed consists of mesoporous nanoparticles with a galactooligosaccharide outer surface that prevents the release of the load and that only selectively opens in degenerative phase cells or senescent cells. The proof of concept demonstrates for the first time that selected chemicals can be released in these cells and not in others,” says Ramón Martínez Máñez, researcher at the IDN Centre — Universitat Politècnica de València and CIBER-BBN member.
The team is located in Spain, State of Valencia with the participation of researchers from the Centro de Reconocimiento Molecular y Desarrollo Tecnológico (IDM), Mixed Unit Universitat Politècnica de València – Universitat de València; the Instituto de Biología Molecular y Celular de Plantas (UPV-CSIC), the Instituto de Investigaciones Biomédicas (CSIC/UAM), the CIBER of Rare Diseases (CIBERER) and CIBER on Bioengineering, Biomaterials and Nanomedicine (CIBER-BBN). The work has been published in the journal Angewandte Chemie.
Source: http://www.uv.es/

North Carolina State University will lead a US nanotechnology research effort to create self-powered devices to help people monitor their health and understand how the surrounding environment affects it, the National Science Foundation announced today. Wireless health monitoring is already a fast-growing industry, but the self-powered technology being developed by researchers means that changing and recharging batteries on current devices could soon be a thing of the past. By using nanomaterials and nanostructures — a nanowire is thousands of times thinner than a human hair — and thermoelectric and piezoelectric materials that use body heat and motion, respectively, as power sources, the new devices will operate on the smallest amounts of energy.

“Currently there are many devices out there that monitor health in different ways,” said Dr. Veena Misra, the center’s director and professor of electrical and computer engineering at NC State. “What’s unique about our technologies is the fact that they are powered by the human body, so they don’t require battery charging.”

The NSF Nanosystems Engineering Research Center for Advanced Self-Powered Systems of Integrated Sensors and Technologies (ASSIST), to be headquartered on NC State’s Centennial Campus, is a joint effort between NC State and partner institutions Florida International University, Pennsylvania State University and the University of Virginia. The center, funded by an initial five-year $18.5 million grant from NSF, also includes five affiliated universities and about 30 industry partners in its global research consortium.
Source: http://news.ncsu.edu/releases/ndassist/

Bioengineered replacements for tendons, ligaments, the meniscus of the knee, and other tissues require re-creation of the exquisite architecture of these tissues in three dimensions. These fibrous, collagen-based tissues located throughout the body have an ordered structure that gives them their robust ability to bear extreme mechanical loading. Many labs have been designing treatments for ACL and meniscus tears of the knee, rotator cuff injuries, and Achilles tendon ruptures for patients ranging from the weekend warrior to the elite Olympian. One popular approach has involved the use of scaffolds made from nano-sized fibers, which can guide tissue to grow in an organized way. Unfortunately, the fibers' widespread application in orthopaedics has been slowed because cells do not readily colonize the scaffolds if fibers are too tightly packed.

Robert L. Mauck, PhD , professor of Orthopaedic Surgery and Bioengineering, and Brendon M. Baker, PhD , previously a graduate student in the Mauck lab at the Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania , have developed and validated a new technology in which composite nanofibrous scaffolds provide a loose enough structure for cells to colonize without impediment, but still can instruct cells how to lay down new tissue . Their findings appear online this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

"These are tiny fibers with a huge potential that can be unlocked by including a temporary, space-holding element," says Mauck. The fibers are on the order of nanometers in diameter. A nanometer is a billionth of a meter.

Source: http://www.uphs.upenn.edu/news/News_Releases/2012/08/composite/

Nano particles are a millionth of a millimeter in size, making them invisible to the human eye. Unless, that is, they are under the microscope of Prof. Madhavi Krishnan, a biophysicist at the University of Zurich (Switzerland). Prof. Krishnan has developed a new method that measures not only the size of the particles but also their electrostatic charge. Up until now it has not been possible to determine the charge of the particles directly. This unique method, which is the first of its kind in the world, is just as important for the manufacture of drugs as in basic research.

Put simply, particles with just a small charge make large circular movements in their traps, while those with a high charge move in small circles. This phenomenon can be compared to that of a light-weight ball which, when thrown, travels further than a heavy one. The US physicist Robert A. Millikan used a similar method 100 years ago in his oil drop experiment to determine the velocity of electrically charged oil drops. In 1923, he received the Nobel Prize in physics in recognition of his achievements. «But he examined the drops in a vacuum», Prof. Krishnan explains. «We on the other hand are examining nano particles in a solution which itself influences the properties of the particles».

Source. http://www.mediadesk.uzh.ch/articles/2012/riesenschritt-in-miniwelt-uzh-forscherin-misst-elektrische-ladung-von-nano-partikeln_en.html

Scientists at the Biodesign Institute at Arizona State University have turned to a promising field called DNA nanotechnology to make an entirely new class of synthetic vaccines. In a study published in the journal Nano Letters, Biodesign immunologist Yung Chang joined forces with her colleagues, including DNA nanotechnology innovator Hao Yan, to develop the first vaccine complex that could be delivered safely and effectively by piggybacking onto self-assembled, three-dimensional DNA nanostructures.

“When Hao treated DNA not as a genetic material, but as a scaffolding material, that made me think of possible applications in immunology,” said Chang, an associate professor in the School of Life Sciences and a researcher in they Biodesign Institute’s Center for Infectious Diseases and Vaccinology. “

Source: https://asunews.asu.edu/20120725_syntheticvaccines

University of Florida researchers have moved a step closer to treating diseases on a cellular level by creating a tiny particle that can be programmed to shut down the genetic production line that cranks out disease-related proteins. In laboratory tests, these newly created “nanorobots” all but eradicated hepatitis C virus infection. The programmable nature of the particle makes it potentially useful against diseases such as cancer and other viral infections.

“This is a novel technology that may have broad application because it can target essentially any gene we want,” said Dr. Chen Liu, professor of pathology at the University of Florida. “This opens the door to new fields so we can test many other things. We’re excited about it.”

A team from MIT is working in the same direction:
See NanoComputer.com former articles:
http://www.nanocomputer.com/?p=2722
AND
http://www.nanocomputer.com/?p=2883

Source:  http://news.ufl.edu/2012/07/16/nanobot/

Scientists from Yale University have discovered a few month ago the source of signals that trigger hair growth, an insight that may lead to fight baldness. The researchers identified stem cells within the skin's fatty layer and showed that molecular signals from these cells were necessary to spur hair growth in mice. "If we can get these fat cells in the skin to talk to the dormant stem cells at the base of hair follicles, we might be able to get hair to grow again," said Valerie Horsley , assistant professor of molecular, cellular and developmental biology at Yale University.

Yale researchers now  captured these images of hair follicles of a mouse, with nuclei of epithelial cells stained in green and mesenchymal cells, which are active in early development, in red. Yale scientists found that mesenchymal cells were crucial to hair growth. 

Source: http://news.yale.edu/2011/09/01/yale-scientists-find-stem-cells-tell-hair-its-time-grow

Researchers have established a novel gene therapy strategy which is an excellent substitute for the current expensive and uncontrollable Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) gene delivery system. The discovery of the hyperbranched poly(amidoamine) (hPAMAM) nanoparticle based hypoxia regulated vascular endothelial growth factor (HRE-VEGF) gene therapy strategy, by Dr Changfa Guo, Professor Chunsheng Wang and their co-investigators from Zhongshan hospital Fudan University, Shanghai, China, provides an economical, feasible and biocompatible gene therapy strategy for cardiac repair.

Transplantation of VEGF gene manipulated mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) has been proposed as a promising therapeutic method for cardiac repair after myocardium infarction. However, the gene delivery system, including the VEGF gene and delivery vehicle, needs to be optimized. 

Zhongshan hospital Fudan University, Shanghai:
  http://www.zs-hospital.sh.cn/e/intro/index.htm

Source: http://www.researchgate.net/publication/228062762_Novel_vascular
_endothelial_growth_factor_gene_delivery_system-anipulated_mesenchymal_stem_cells_repair_infarcted_myocardium

A team from Northwestern University  led by a physician-scientist and a chemist — from the fields of dermatology and nanotechnology — is the first to demonstrate the use of commercial moisturizers to deliver gene regulation technology that has great potential for life-saving therapies for skin cancers. The topical delivery of gene regulation technology to cells deep in the skin is extremely difficult because of the formidable defenses skin provides for the body. The Northwestern approach takes advantage of drugs consisting of novel spherical arrangements of nucleic acids. These structures, each about 1,000 times smaller than the diameter of a human hair, have the unique ability to recruit and bind to natural proteins that allow them to traverse the skin and enter cells.

Applied directly to the skin, the drug penetrates all of the skin’s layers and can selectively target disease-causing genes while sparing normal genes. Once in cells, the drug simply flips the switch of the troublesome genes to “off.”

Source: http://www.northwestern.edu/newscenter/stories/2012/07/skin-disease-treatment.html

Arrowhead Research Corporation, a targeted therapeutics company, today announced the publication of data demonstrating that its anti-obesity drug candidate, Adipotide, induces rapid metabolic changes with implications for Type II diabetes. An independent laboratory reported that obese mice treated with Adipotide displayed significantly improved insulin sensitivity, improved glucose tolerance, and a reduction in serum triglycerides after only 2-3 days of treatment. These effects occurred independent of and prior to Adipotide-induced weight loss. 

"A large amount of data generated over the past eight years across multiple laboratories have suggested that Adipotide is a unique and potentially powerful agent against the obesity epidemic," said Dr. Christopher Anzalone, President and Chief Executive Officer of Arrowhead. "This new study suggests that it may also be a powerful agent against obesity's sister epidemic, Type II diabetes."

The findings, published online ahead of print in the Journal of the American Diabetes Association, are presented in a paper titled "Rapid and weight-independent improvement of glucose tolerance induced by a peptide designed to elicit apoptosis in adipose tissue endothelium." The research team is led by Director of the Cincinnati Diabetes and Obesity Center, Dr. Randy Seeley.

Source: http://www.arrowres.com/publications/2012/june26_2012.html

Scientists are reporting an advance toward treating disease with minute capsules containing not drugs — but the DNA and other biological machinery for making the drug. In an article in ACS’ journal Nano Letters, they describe engineering micro- and nano-sized capsules that contain the genetically coded instructions, plus the read-out gear and assembly line for protein synthesis that can be switched on with an external signal.

   Daniel Anderson’s group from M.I.T., author of the article (http://video.mit.edu/watch/inside-the-lab-daniel-g-anderson-phd-8385/),  developed an artificial, remotely activated nanoparticle system containing DNA and the other “parts” necessary to make proteins, which are the workhorses of the human cell and are often used as drugs. They describe the nanoscale production units, which are tiny spheres encapsulating protein-making machinery like that found in living cells. The resulting nanoparticles produced active proteins on demand when the researchers shined a laser light on them. The nanoparticles even worked when they were injected into mice, which are stand-ins for humans in the laboratory, producing proteins when a laser was shone onto the animals. This innovation “may find utility in the localized delivery of therapeutics,” say the researchers.

Source: http://pubs.acs.org/stoken/presspac/presspac/full/10.1021/nl2036047

Enabling bioengineers to design new molecular machines for nanotechnology applications is one of the possible outcomes of a study by University of Montreal researchers that was published in Nature Structural and Molecular Biology today.  The scientists have developed a new approach to visualize how proteins assemble, which may also significantly aid our understanding of diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's, which are caused by errors in assembly.

Alzheimer's and Parkinson's,are caused by errors in assembly. Here shown are two different assembly stages (purple and red) of the protein ubiquitin and the fluorescent probe used to visualize these stage (tryptophan: see yellow). 


“In order to survive, all creatures, from bacteria to humans, monitor and transform their environments using small protein nanomachines made of thousands of atoms,” explained the senior author of the study, Prof. Stephen Michnick of the university's department of biochemistry. “For example, in our sinuses, there are complex receptor proteins that are activated in the presence of different odor molecules. Some of those scents warn us of danger; others tell us that food is nearby.” Proteins are made of long linear chains of amino acids, which have evolved over millions of years to self-assemble extremely rapidly – often within thousandths of a split second – into a working nanomachine. “One of the main challenges for biochemists is to understand how these linear chains assemble into their correct structure given an astronomically large number of other possible forms,” Michnick said.

Source: http://www.nouvelles.umontreal.ca/udem-news/news/20120611-researchers-watch-tiny-living-machines-self-assemble.html

Scientists from the University of Utah have adapted the “nanopore” method to find DNA damage that can lead to mutations and disease. Indeed sequencing DNA – decipher genetic blueprints – is faster and cheaper by passing strands of the genetic material through molecule-sized pores. Strands of DNA are made of “nucleotide bases” known as A, T, G and C. Some stretches of DNA strands are genes.The new method looks for places where a base is missing, known as an “abasic site,” one of the most frequent forms of damage in the 3-billion-base human genome or genetic blueprint. This kind of DNA damage happens 18,000 times a day in a typical cell as we are exposed to everything from sunlight to car exhaust. Most of the damage is repaired, but sometimes it leads to a gene mutation and ultimately disease.

“We’re using this technique and synthetic organic chemistry to be able to see a damage site as it flies through the nanopore,” says Henry White, distinguished professor and chair of chemistry at the University of Utah and senior coauthor of the new study.

Source: http://unews.utah.edu/news_releases/utah-chemists-use-nanopores-to-detect-dna-damage/

Cornell engineers, taking an engineer's approach to making synthetic blood vessels have designed  tiny, 3-D microchannels in a soft biomaterial and injected human umbilical vein endothelial cells into the channels. They embedded tissue cells from the brain into the surrounding gel and watched the interactions between the "vessels" and cells, which commonly surround microvessels in the body.
Let's remind that human tissue, be it in the heart, brain or bones, can't function without a vascular system — the intricate network of vessels that circulate life-sustaining blood and nutrients.

Here, left picture,  you see a reconstruction of fluorescence confocal micrographs of a microvascular network with endothelial-cell lines channels (red) and perivascular cells (green) in collagen. 

Signals from these tissue cells led to new blood vessels sprouting from the originals — a living network of blood vessels engineered completely in vitro.The results, which could lead to new techniques in regenerative medicine and better drug delivery strategies, are from the lab of Abe Stroock, associate professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering and member of the Kavli Institute at Cornell for Nanoscale Science.

Source: http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/May12/stroockMicrovessels.html

Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute suggests that the replication process for DNA — the genetic instructions for living organisms that is composed of four bases (C, G, A and T) — is more open to unnatural letters than had previously been thought. An expanded "DNA alphabet" could carry more information than natural DNA, potentially coding for a much wider range of molecules and enabling a variety of powerful applications, from precise molecular probes and nanomachines to useful new life forms.

We now know that the efficient replication of our unnatural base pair isn't a fluke, and also that the replication process is more flexible than had been assumed,"" said Floyd E. Romesberg, associate professor at Scripps Research, principal developer of the new DNA bases, and a senior author of the new study. The Romesberg laboratory collaborated on the new study with the laboratory of co-senior author Andreas Marx at the University of Konstanz in Germany, and the laboratory of Tammy J. Dwyer at the University of San Diego.
Romesberg and his lab have been trying to find a way to extend the DNA alphabet since the late 1990s. In 2008, they developed the efficiently replicating bases NaM and 5SICS, which come together as a complementary base pair within the DNA helix, much as, in normal DNA, the base adenine (A) pairs with thymine (T), and cytosine (C) pairs with guanine (G).

Source:  http://www.nature.com/nchembio/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nchembio.966.html

Several studies have demonstrated that the average life of organisms, including that of mammals, can be lengthened by acting on different genes. Until now this has included permanent modifications in animal genes starting in the embryonic phase, something which is not intended to be carried out with humans. Researchers at CNIO and CBATEG now have proved it possible to prolong the life of mice using a treatment which acts directly on the genes, but is used in adult animals and is applied only once. This is achieved through gene therapy, a strategy never before used to fight the aging process.

The therapy demonstrated to be safe and effective in mice. Researchers worked with adult mice aged one year and older mice aged two. In both cases the gene therapy had a "rejuvenating" effect. The mice which were treated at one year of age on average lived 24% longer.

This research is led at the Spanish National Cancer Research Centre (CNIO) by director Maria A. Blasco, in collaboration with Eduard Ayuso and Fátima Bosch, of the Centre for Animal Biotechnology and Gene Therapy (CBATEG) at the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona UAB, Spain.

Source: http://www.uab.es/servlet/Satellite/latest-news/news-detail/lifespan-of-mice-grows-by-24–1096476786473.html?noticiaid=1337064121411

Alliance researchers, Robert Langer, Sc.D. (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) and Omid Farokhzad, M.D., (Harvard Medical School), with a team of researchers from BIND Biosciences demonstrated the ability of a nanomedicine to target a receptor found on cancer cells and accumulate at tumor sites. The study, published in the journal Science Translational Medicine, indicates the treatment is safe in mice and is capable of shrinking patient tumors.

The nanoparticles feature a homing molecule that allows them to specifically attack cancer cells, and are the first such targeted particles to enter human clinical studies. Originally developed by researchers at MIT and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, the particles are designed to carry the chemotherapy drug docetaxel, used to treat lung, prostate and breast cancers, among others The particles were also shown to be safe and effective: Many of the patients’ tumors shrank as a result of the treatment, even when they received lower doses than those usually administered. 

Source: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2012/cancer-particle-0404.html

Researchers at Harvard-affiliated McLean Hospital have shown a new category of "green" nanoparticles comprised of a non-toxic, protein-based nanotechnology that can non-invasively cross the blood brain barrier and is capable of transporting various types of drugs.In an article published May 1, 2012 online in PLoS ONE, Gordana Vitaliano, MD, director of the Brain Imaging NaNoTechnology Group at the McLean Hospital Imaging Center, reported that clathrin protein, a ubiquitous protein found in human, animal, plant, bacteria and fungi cells, can been modified for use as a nanoparticle for in-vivo studies.

"This study provides a new insight into utilizing bioengineered clathrin protein as a novel nanoplatform that passes the blood brain barrier," said Vitaliano, who successfully attached different fluorescent labels, commonly used in imaging, to functionalize clathrin nanoparticles. "We were able to show that the clathrin nanoparticles could be non-invasively delivered to the central nervous system (CNS) in animals. The clathrin performed significantly."

Source: http://www.mclean.harvard.edu/news/press/current.php?kw=mclean-hospital
-researchers-report-on-a-new-nanotechnology
-that-may-enhance-medication-delivery-and-improve-mri-performance&id=175

Could engineered human stem cells hold the key to cancer survival? Scientists at the Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology (IBN) in Singapore, have discovered that neural stem cells possess the innate ability to target tumor cells outside the central nervous system. This finding, which was demonstrated successfully on breast cancer cells, was recently published in leading peer reviewed journal, Stem Cells.

A team of researchers led by IBN Group Leader, Dr Shu Wang, has made a landmark discovery that neural stem cells (NSCs) derived from human induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells could be used to treat breast cancer. The effectiveness of using NSCs, which originate from the central nervous system, to treat brain tumors has been investigated in previous studies. This is the first study that demonstrates that iPS cell-derived NSCs could also target tumors outside the central nervous system, to treat both primary and secondary tumors.

Source: http://www.a-star.edu.sg/?TabId=828&articleType=ArticleView&arti, cell stemcleId=1626

A metal cube the size of a toaster, created at the University of Alberta (U of A) in Canada, is capable of performing the same genetic tests as most fully equipped modern laboratories—and in a fraction of the time.

 Plastic chip that can perform 20 genetic tests from a single drop of blood: a kind of a lab-on-a-chip

At its core is a small plastic chip developed with nanotechnology that holds the key to determining whether a patient is resistant to cancer drugs or has viruses like malaria. The chip can also pinpoint infectious diseases in a herd of cattle.

Source: http://www.news.ualberta.ca/article.aspx?id=0EC281968D4C4F15A76D0E6D088C4F55

Using a novel nanotechnology-based approach the californian company Medistem Inc. in San Diego,  has disclosed  a new approach to stimulating the immune system to kill tumor cells. Medistem and a team of collaborators demonstrated that nanoparticles could be used to deliver molecules found on tumors to specific cells of the immune system called “dendritic cells.” These nanoparticle-loaded dendritic cells were then able to stimulate other cells of the immune system to directly kill tumors in the test tube and also in mice bearing prostate cancer.

“Cellular therapy is a clinical reality, for example, the company Dendreon developed the first therapeutic FDA-approved cancer vaccine Sipuleucel-T (Provenge) that is currently being used for treatment of patients with hormone-resistant prostate cancer. The data we published today provides ways of optimizing treatments such as Provenge,” said Dr. Vladimir Bogin, President and Chairman of Medistem. “By using nanotechnology to specifically educate dendritic cells to activate the immune system in patients, it may be possible to develop more effective ways of treating cancer by leveraging the body’s own resources.”

Source:  PLGA nanoparticle-mediated delivery of tumor antigenic peptides elicits effective immune responses. International Journal of Nanomedicine, 7: 1475, 2012 
Link: http://medisteminc.com/2012/medistem-industryacademia-collaboration-leads-to-nanotechnology-based-cancer-vaccine/

Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass) have provided the first evidence that engineered nanoparticles are able to accumulate within plants and damage their DNA. In a recent paper, the team led by NIST chemist Bryant C. Nelson showed that under laboratory conditions, cupric oxide nanoparticles have the capacity to enter plant root cells and generate many mutagenic DNA base lesions.

The team tested the human-made, ultrafine particles between 1 and 100 nanometers in size on a human food crop, the radish, and two species of common groundcovers used by grazing animals, perennial and annual ryegrass. This research is part of NIST's work to help characterize the potential environmental, health and safety (EHS) risks of nanomaterials, and develop methods for identifying and measuring them.

Source: http://www.nist.gov/mml/biochemical/nanoparticles-041712.cfm

Nanoresearchers at the Methodist Neurological Institute and Rice University   have developed a way to selectively kill brain cancer cells by using a tiny syringe to deliver a combination of chemotherapy drugs directly in the cells.
"Without our nano-delivery system, we know that current drug delivery would be highly toxic to patients if we tried to deliver all three of these drugs at once," said David Baskin, M.D., neurosurgeon at the Methodist Neurological Institute, who began his nanomedicine research in 2004 with the late Nobel laureate and Rice chemist Richard Smalley. "But delivered in combination using these nano-syringes, our research demonstrated extreme lethality, with at least a three-fold increase in the number of dead cancer cells following treatment. The nano-syringes selectively deliver these drugs only to cancer cells, and appear not to be toxic to normal neurons and other non-cancerous brain cells." 

In a study published online April 15 in Nature Medicine, a second  team led by Sam Gambhir, MD, PhD, professor and chair of radiology, showed that the minuscule nanoparticles engineered in his lab homed in on and highlighted brain tumors, precisely delineating their boundaries and greatly easing their complete removal. The new technique could someday help improve the prognosis of patients with deadly brain cancers. 

Human brain scans. Like special-forces troops laser-tagging targets for a bomber pilot, tiny particules that can be imaged three different ways at once have enabled Stanford Univeristy School of Medicine to remove brain tumors from mice with unprecedented accuracy.

"With brain tumors, surgeons don't have the luxury of removing large amounts of surrounding normal brain tissue to be sure no cancer cells are left," said Gambhir, who is the Virginia and D.K. Ludwig Professor for Clinical Investigation in Cancer Research and director of the Molecular Imaging Program at Stanford. "You clearly have to leave as much of the healthy brain intact as you possibly can."

Source: http://med.stanford.edu/ism/2012/april/nanoparticle.html